


Couch & Breakfast

by ThePagemistress



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: Formula 3 era, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-26 14:22:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10788486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThePagemistress/pseuds/ThePagemistress
Summary: Niki has something of a hangover, James has a solution.For the Tumblr dialogue prompt: "It's 8:30, I have a hangover and you're annoying me."





	Couch & Breakfast

Niki grumbled into his pillow as a sudden burst of light flared through his eyelids, forcing him to scrunch them tighter closed. He tried to bury his head under the pillow before realising, no, he wasn’t in bed, he was on the settee and those cushions weren’t budging.

No wonder every inch of him felt like a bruise. He hated sleeping on this thing. Never mind the banging headache he was starting to acknowledge.

“Good afternoon!”

Niki groaned indignantly at the far too chipper voice. “No.”

“No, it’s not good or no, it’s not afternoon?” James asked and Niki didn’t need to open his eyes to see the gleeful smirk on the man’s face. Insufferable.

“Both,” he replied, squinting an eye open to look at his watch. “It’s 8:30, I have a hangover and you’re annoying me.”

He heard James hum and then felt his arm pulled away from him as James examined his wrist. He wanted to yell at him but he was gentle enough about it that it didn’t seem warranted. Besides, Niki didn’t want to talk any more than he had to.

“I think you will find, my ratty friend, that your watch is broken.”

Niki dragged his arm back, staring at the watch face, waiting for the second hand to move. It didn’t. “Shit.”

“Indeed. It’s actually around half past one.”

Niki groaned again before having a distant spike of panic. It took him several seconds to place why.

“Fuck!” he yelled, pushing himself upright on his elbows and trying not to sway as his entire being tried to recalibrate itself. James was perched beside him, hands poised to steady him should he need it.

“So eloquent in the mornings,” he commented.

“I have a meeting.”

“I think you mean ‘had’,” James pointed out.

Niki’s heart sank, only to be swiftly replaced with irritation at the man’s presence. He batted James’ hands away as he attempted to rise from the settee. James was having none of it and forced him back down with frustrating ease.

“Let go of me, asshole! It was important, I have to-“

“Oh, you could have fooled me what with the amount of times you circled the appointment on the calendar,” James teased. “Relax, Niki. I called the bank for you. They rearranged for Tuesday.” Niki blinked at him, owlishly, still not quite firing on all cylinders. “I circled it and everything. To assert its importance over any of my ‘silly’ appointments.”

James was smiling at him, oh-so proud of himself but at the same time not exactly smug. It was unsettling. “It took me weeks to get that appointment. What did you tell them?”

James shrugged. "I just told then that you'd spent the entire night working on a Very Important Project and you'd be unable to make it at the required time. They wanted to reschedule it for a month's time but...well. You know me, Niki. I like to get my way."

"You flirted with the receptionist."

"Who would say no to this face?" James asked, grin turning slightly wicked.

"You went down there?" Niki asked in surprise.

"Flowers don't have the same effect over the phone, strangely. By the way, you owe me £4 for flowers."

Niki felt the instinctively familiar rebuttal rise in his throat but he fought it down. He was suddenly feeling unbalanced in ways that couldn't be put down to the hangover. Just when he thought he understood James Hunt, he'd go and do something like offer him a couch to sleep on or apparently re-arrange important meetings for him while he was passed out drunk on said couch. Just to complicate matters. What a bastard.

James broke the stretched silence by saying, “I think the words you’re looking for are ‘thank you’.”

“Toast,” Niki said, instead.

“I haven’t prepared anything but if you insist,” James replied, without blinking at the non-sequitur. “It is with great pride that I-“

“I want some toast,” Niki interrupted, rolling his eyes and fighting back a smile.

“Well, I’m sure you know where the kitchen is by now, dear,” came James’ reply. But Niki still wasn’t quite feeling up to moving and made this point known by slumping back down into the couch and throwing an arm over his eyes.

“I am in no state to cook.”

“Oh!” James exclaimed and the moment Niki processed what he’d said, he winced knowing what was coming. “’Toast doesn’t count as cooking, James,’” the Brit imitated. “’You don’t have gourmet toast, James.’ Are you getting the hypocrisy, Niki?”

“Your choices are to either make me toast or leave me to sleep,” Niki said, despite feeling less tired by the second.

“You know, for a house guest, you’re quite insufferable,” James replied, even as he made his way into the kitchen to get things prepared. “Must have been quite a night,” he continued, raising his voice so Niki wouldn’t have to move to hear him. “Never known you sleep past 10. Plus a broken watch and some _highly_ suspicious marks on your neck…”

Niki rolled his eyes but found his fingers coming up to his neck anyway, eyes widening as he felt the marks there, wisps of memories flitting across his mind as to how he got them.

“Some might accuse me of being a bad influence on you,” James continued.

“You take far too much credit,” Niki replied, absently.

“That I’ve definitely been accused of.” James made a reappearance but instead of toast, he was holding a glass of water and some pills. He waved them both in front of Niki’s face and he took them without argument. "I have to say, I'm feeling a little left out. Looks like it was my kind of time. What was the occasion?"

Niki stared at James for a moment, gears visibly working in his brain before he turned away to knock back a couple of the pills. "Nothing in particular," he said. It was obvious from James' expression that he didn't quite buy it but also didn't press it either. He did, however, point at one of the more prominent hickeys on his neck.

"Anyone I know?"

"Wouldn't surprise me," Niki shot back.

James' grin seemed to be just a little more muted than Niki had expected it to be. "Well, I hope she was worth missing that all important meeting for," James said with a wink as he headed back into the kitchen.

Niki slumped back further into the couch, sipping at the water. He hadn't lied exactly, there hadn't been a special occasion. He'd been working late, trying to make contacts here, there and everywhere to pursue this stupid racing career. Also looking for somewhere to live, although that may have been a little more half-hearted than it should have been.

When he'd eventually made it back to the flat, it was to be greeted by James screwing around with a woman he didn't recognise. Not for the first time and certainly not for the last but something just kind of...snapped in him. He turned tail immediately and headed for a bar. 

He hadn't intended for the night to go quite as it did and he admittedly didn't remember a whole lot of it but even someone as awkward as him could get a girl interested when calling himself a racing driver. And he would loved to have been able to kid himself that he was doing it to make some kind of point. That he was proving that he too could get girls just like James Hunt could. But he wan't a fool, even when it was himself trying to do the fooling.

He wasn't jealous of James. He was jealous of her. Of all of them.

And it was only getting worse. Because initially it had all just been the playboy charm and the good looks and Niki had assumed that once he got to know him and that charming facade got dropped for something more simple and friendly, the attraction would fade.

But it didn't. Because frustratingly enough, James' charm didn't disappear, it just shifted. It became intimate teasing, encouraging nudges, pep talks that always ended with a well-meaning insult. A couch to sleep on, painkillers to take, toast to eat. And the attraction began to manifest into something more fond. Something he didn't especially want to get into. And something that was making it more and more agonising when Niki strolled into the flat to find a woman with her legs wrapped around James' waist.

"Your toast, sir," James said, suddenly appearing at his side and startling him out of his thoughts.

Niki sat up and took the plate offered to him, eyebrow raised. He had been given not just a plate of toast but some various sliced meats from his side of the fridge, some cheese and a bit of leafy salad with sliced tomatoes to boot. When Niki turned his gaze back to James, he affected an even more upper class accent as he said, "Does it please our guest?" That mischievous glint in his eye betraying him.

Niki took a bite of the toast and it was crisped to perfection. Not burnt anywhere but with a delightful crunch. He saw James' expectant face and drew out the silence just to wind him up. Eventually, he said with a smack of his lips. "I have to say...that if I had to describe this toast to a friend? It would be gourmet."

James preened at the praise, as silly as it was. "Only the best for you, Niki," he said. And then he was slapping at Niki's legs to force him to make room on the couch for him to sit. "Now, how about you tell me about your friend and where I might find her later tonight."

And Niki prided himself on how he didn't flinch. 


End file.
